


And The Silver Spoon

by sprucetree



Category: Star Trek: Lower Decks (Cartoon)
Genre: Constructive Criticism Welcome, Family Issues, Gen, Pre-Season 1, Tiny Bit of Angst at the End
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-09
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-17 08:49:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29963889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sprucetree/pseuds/sprucetree
Summary: Someone has to get coffee for the bridge crew, and Mariner is determined to make sure it’s not going to be her.
Relationships: Brad Boimler & Beckett Mariner, Carol Freeman & Beckett Mariner
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	And The Silver Spoon

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies for the mix-up yesterday, I hit "publish" instead of "draft" (I usually do a final edit on here in drafts before posting anything) and was spending way too much time re-editing, so I just deleted the other fic and decided to reupload the final version the first time in a new post. 
> 
> Anyway, this was my attempt to write Freeman and Mariner, and also a bit of platonic Mariner and Boimler interaction set before the show. It feels OOC the more I reread it but I'm trying not to nitpick myself too much. Either way, thanks for reading!

Mariner let out a sigh, pulling the sides of her boots up. Morning fogginess-- could it even be called morning if they were continually floating in the darkness of space?-- was still clouding her head, making it hard to concentrate on anything other than the material in her hands. Below her, she heard the familiar shuffle of her bunkmate yanking open a storage containment to their right.  Before she could open her mouth again to comment on what looked like an odd purple bottle laying out in the open in his storage drawer, her PADD beeped once. Leaning to her right to glance at the words on-screen, she muffled a groan.

“What?”

“Oh, just another gracious reminder that I'm in charge of the coffee runs for the senior officers.” She didn’t bother to keep the overwhelming sense of bitterness out of her voice.

“On the bridge?” Boimler perked up, his eyes suddenly finding her face. 

Shoving her sleeves back up her arm one by one, Mariner groaned and rolled her eyes. “Yep ,” she muttered, letting her feet hang over the bed’s edge as she scooted closer to speak. “For the next week or so, I’m basically a glorified errand girl, considering--”

She stopped short and bit her tongue. Nope, not a chance. It had only been a few months since she had been kicked off the Quito and unceremoniously dumped onto the Cerritos, but she had done pretty well so far with keeping her secret. She couldn’t afford to let that little piece of private information slip to anyone on board, especially him of all people. The few times they had talked for more than a minute, she had come away realizing her threshold for overhearing someone ass-kissing the senior staff was far lower than she realized. And considering she had most of her life to build it up, that was a pretty impressive feat. Opening this certain Pandora’s box would definitely make bunking with him  _ way _ more difficult than necessary.

“Considering…?”

Hiding a grimace, she glanced back at her PADD. “Nothing.” 

_ Dammit, I’m gonna have to do a better job at keeping my mouth shut. _

Thankfully, his mind had already wandered elsewhere as he adjusted the badge on his shirt. “I wish I had an excuse to go on the bridge regularly,” he said with a trace of wistfulness in his voice. 

“Well, wish for something else ,” she stated derisively, leaning against the side of the bunk. “Again. Not that fun. And not that much of an honor.” It was abundantly clear to her Freeman didn’t give a shit about these little chores, she was just trying to use them as some kind of weird, self-absorbed power play. 

Respect didn’t factor into it. And love certainly never did.

“To you, maybe,” he shot back, narrowing his eyes. 

“Uh huh. Whatever you say.” 

Tapping her fingernail on the glowing screen, she stared once more at the words. Then, a thought occurred to her. With a small smile growing on her face, Mariner turned back around.

“Actually, Boimler… I have an idea.” 

* * *

Freeman crossed her legs, keeping a keen eye on the stats being presented onscreen. After a successful second contact, the bridge crew was once again at its typical capacity, with most of the senior officers working quietly at their stations. 

Looking down at her PADD to double check that what she saw on screen matched what the diplomat had told her, Freeman narrowed her eyes in concentration. Then, all of a sudden, she saw the familiar color of a replicated coffee cup suddenly appear in her field of vision. Her mouth turned upwards into a faint but genuine smile. 

“Thank you. I really appreciate--”

An instant later, she registered the pale hand.

“What is this?”

Above her, a skinny ensign in red blinked and smiled nervously. “Decaf with hazelnut creamer…?”

With a short sigh, Freeman turned around further in her seat to face him directly. “No. I mean, why are  _ you _ the one delivering it? Where’s Ensign Mariner?”

He straightened up a bit, squaring his shoulders. “I figured it would get here faster if I did it, and she said she doesn’t mind letting me--”

With a joyful bellow, Shaxs stood up straight at his station and interrupted the two’s conversation. “Hey! Drink run! Can I get a macchiato, son? Uh… one of the caramel ones. And make it  _ large _ .” To emphasize, he held both his hands out about a foot apart.

“Espresso. Double shot of caffeine.” T’ana’s dry no-nonsense voice was easy to hear from her seat next to Freeman.

“You know, I could go for a cold brew, myself…” Ransom thought out loud from Freeman’s other side, his hand on his chin as he stared off into the deep recesses of space. 

“Yes, sirs!” The ensign nodded multiple times as each officer spoke, beaming. He was already starting to walk off when Freeman raised her hand to stop him in his tracks. 

“Ok, just-- hold on, this is Ensign Mariner’s duty. Did she pawn this off onto you?”

After getting caught with one too many bundles of contraband, Mariner had been assigned a fairly irritating but easy punishment in lieu of her usual time in the brig-- fetching coffee for the bridge crew. But of course, in the end, nothing with her daughter could ever be that easy. Mariner had found a way around it, and now she had roped some other ensign into her plan too? 

“No, cap’n, I asked for it,” he replied proudly, still holding the cup. 

_ Interesting _ . Either this man was lying and therefore knew her daughter enough to be persuaded into covering for her, or he obviously was gunning for some kind of promotion. The longer she looked at his nervous smile, the more she came to the conclusion it was likely a mix of both. She filed those pieces of information away for future use. 

A second later, she touched her combadge and spoke into it. “Send Ensign Mariner to the bridge.” 

Then, she turned her head and locked eyes with the increasingly anxious man. “What’s your name?” she asked in a low voice.

“I-- I didn’t mean to--”

“Name.”

“Ensign Bradward Boimler, captain.”

She took in his stance and how he kept his hands behind his back. “You’re command division, correct?” 

“Yes, cap’n, uh-- captain.” 

Freeman let the silence stretch on for longer than what was necessarily comfortable, a negotiation tactic she had learned early on in her career. She could have sworn he was the kind to pipe up with another piece of information, but interestingly enough, he had the good sense to not speak out of nervousness. 

_ Hmm. I’ll have to keep an eye on this one, _ Freeman noted to herself in the back of her mind. For now, she’d believe his story. But only for now. 

She held him under her gaze for another handful of seconds before sighing. “You can go.”

Boimler notably relaxed at her words, but still seemed on edge as he walked across the bridge to the turbolift. As the doors opened, she saw him adjusting his sleeves. His nervousness only increased once he saw who else was in the turbolift. 

Staring back at them both was a disgruntled Mariner. As she pushed past the other ensign roughly enough to knock shoulders, Freeman could have sworn she heard her mutter something about weasels.

Walking right up to her chair, her daughter crossed her arms and waited. They had these kinds of conversations enough to know how they usually went. Neither of them were the type to waste any time on obvious questions or obvious answers. 

“You’ve earned yourself one more week of this, you know that, right?” The words came out low enough that only the two of them could hear them.

Tactically, Mariner chose to hold her tongue in front of the rest of the crew. She just shrugged once and furrowed her eyebrows further.

“Alright,” Freeman stated diplomatically, relaxing in her seat. Maybe this time would be what got through to her. Unlikely, considering it hadn’t ever yet, but she still hoped. 

After they made the call to have Mariner step down from the Quito, Freeman had felt like there was an invisible weight on her shoulders as well as her daughter’s. One more screw up and Mariner was done in Starfleet. It wasn’t like when she was a child-- there were no redos, no make-up exams, no quick apologies to smooth over the whole damn thing. There were some issues that even a captain and an admiral couldn’t fix. And Freeman was running out of ways to make her understand just how precarious her position was. 

After all, there was no doubt in her mind her daughter had far too much potential to languish like this in a lowly ensign position. But she was still resisting her guidance every step of the way. Every conversation the two had felt like a chore. 

Not that they got a chance to talk too civilly that often anyway. More and more often lately, they had barely been on speaking terms outside of a few strictly professional interactions. And even those felt tenuous at times.

Then, out of the corner of her eyes, she saw Mariner twitch her nose twice, a habit she had had for… how many years now? It must have been since she was a child. So long ago, back before either of them had even set foot on this ship... 

A hazy memory of curly hair gathered up into two carefully done pigtails and a small chubby hand reaching out to grab tight onto her pants leg made Freeman catch her breath. It was a brief flash, barely even there, but it still made her heart ache. 

“Need me for anything else,  _ captain _ ?” Mariner stretched the last word out in a syrupy sweet fake voice. Her tone made Freeman wince involuntarily. 

Then she cleared her throat, feeling strangely lost for words. 

“No. You’re… free to go back to the lower decks.” 

“Wonderful,” she heard Mariner mutter under her breath as she turned on her heel and walked off. A few seconds later, the soft click of the turbolift followed. However, Freeman barely noted it, still lost in thought. 

“... --tain? Captain?”

She snapped her head up. “Hmm, yes?” Then she turned to see Ransom staring back at her with a quizzical look on his face. 

“Oh, I just was trying to, uh, get your attention. Is the map on-screen correct?” 

Realizing the whole crew was waiting for her to approve their next destination, she sat up straighter. After examining the screen with a clouded mind, she nodded once. “Go to warp.” 

“Acknowledged.” 

Then Freeman stood abruptly. “I’ll be in my ready room.” Without waiting for any reply from Ransom, she made her way to the automatic doors. 

Maybe it was his imagination, but he could have sworn he saw her wiping at something in the corner of her eyes. 

**Author's Note:**

> The title is supposed to be a reference from a lyric from Harry Chapin's "Cats in the Cradle" by the way.


End file.
